I'm new, I'm struggling

[Lime]

I'm on normal. I have 26 units against my opponents 20. I have 3 generals, 2 light cav, 3 red bow, 3 grey bow, 1 matchlock, 1 fire bomb, 13 grey yari. CPU on normal has 2 Generals, 6 grey bow, 8 red yari sam and 4 grey yari. I have played this fight 8 times by now. I'm brand new, but seeing a ton of forums talk about never needing anything better than grey yari besides for variety, I'm at a loss on the strategic approach. I use my better bows and guns to skirmish against the CPU for a bit, then try to flank with cav on outside units.

I know they have better troop quality, but it's on normal so I know I'm doing something wrong. Some youtube videos show just full charging the enemy with your full army and just overwhelming them with numbers. I tried that but my morale falls too fast and my lines rout. Any advice for a newbie? Also, I pause the game, adjust my troops, press play, pause again, micro manage. I'm playing turn based Total War and still losing terribly.

[Chinglechong]

Yari Ashigaru has Yari wall whereas Yari Samurai do not. Keep the same strategy, try and bait them by taking out their skirmishers with yours. If you do they will send their Infantry and right before they hit your lines put each Yari Ashigaru into Yari wall. If you can't take out their Skirmishers in a good time charge your infantry with a unit or 2 of Ashigaru in front of your main line to take the arrows. They will be your sacrifice, and if all goes to plan your main line of Ashigaru should still be at full strength. Put them into Yari wall right before you hit their Infantry, and position your fire bombs right behind your infantry. Target where they have bulked up their Infantry the most and keep same cav strat go for their general. This should help as Yari wall is what's going to win you the battle.

[Trebor797]

If you have issues with morale and you have 3 generals make sure ur generals are close behind ur lines and spread out over ur formation (so in ur case 1 left flank 1 middle 1 right flank) so that every unit is within the aura of a general. If you have the ability stand and fight I would recommend using it, its a nice boost to troops stats

[easytarget]

Wouldn't one of the more obvious suggestions be to switch to easy?

Or be sure to play one of the easiest clans (for example not those located in the center of the island).

[Lime]

Originally posted by easytarget:

Wouldn't one of the more obvious suggestions be to switch to easy?

Or be sure to play one of the easiest clans (for example not those located in the center of the island).

Most games allow players to develop bad habits or even rely on bad habits or mechanics to cheese wins that don't exist on normal or higher difficulty. So I avoid playing on easy for all games. I want to know what I am doing wrong / how to improve rather than lower the difficulty.
Also I am playing as the Chokobso(sp) that start on thier own island and have the "best?" bowman in the game.

[Lime]

Originally posted by Chinglechong:

Yari Ashigaru has Yari wall whereas Yari Samurai do not. Keep the same strategy, try and bait them by taking out their skirmishers with yours. If you do they will send their Infantry and right before they hit your lines put each Yari Ashigaru into Yari wall. If you can't take out their Skirmishers in a good time charge your infantry with a unit or 2 of Ashigaru in front of your main line to take the arrows. They will be your sacrifice, and if all goes to plan your main line of Ashigaru should still be at full strength. Put them into Yari wall right before you hit their Infantry, and position your fire bombs right behind your infantry. Target where they have bulked up their Infantry the most and keep same cav strat go for their general. This should help as Yari wall is what's going to win you the battle.

Thank you for all this, I will try to apply this next time I play. I didn't consider running at the bowman at all and have been trying to break them with my own bows and cav. I also didn't consider using Yari Wall offensively. That's an awesome idea.

[jackeddiegouber]

The only way you are going to win this battle is if you use yari wall. You are outclassed in the melee department, so you will have to use the formation. I would recommend retreating, or not attacking. If you have never used yari wall, you are going to struggle. The only thing you have in your favor is number of units. You also did not mention the experience level for you units. Boot camp Ashigaru will route very easy and are very weak. I would also mouse over the auto resolve to see the predicted outcome. If you are not even with them, then avoid this battle. The only thing you are doing wrong is on the campaign map. I don't care how good at battles you are, you will struggle with this one, even on normal.

[easytarget]

Originally posted by Lime:

Originally posted by easytarget:

Wouldn't one of the more obvious suggestions be to switch to easy?

Or be sure to play one of the easiest clans (for example not those located in the center of the island).

Most games allow players to develop bad habits or even rely on bad habits or mechanics to cheese wins that don't exist on normal or higher difficulty. So I avoid playing on easy for all games. I want to know what I am doing wrong / how to improve rather than lower the difficulty.
Also I am playing as the Chokobso(sp) that start on thier own island and have the "best?" bowman in the game.

The real bad habit is playing a game at a difficulty where you can't learn the game mechanics w/o giving up.

Bad habits can be overcome, game abandonment can't.

The Chokoboso are alright as they start on their own island. But there aren't enough provinces on it to scale up sufficiently at the outset before you'll be forced onto the main island.

My personal preference for an easy clan to play is the Shimazu. You start at the end of the map on an island. The goal is simple in the initial phase of the campaign, recruit ash, take over the island you start on with them, build ports and take over the euro trade nodes literally right by your starting position for reliable income the rest of the campaign. That's it. The rest is just a march up the island towards Kyoto, pausing to prep for realm divide along the way.

[Sn3z]

For future learning; put simply your army composition is just not good. I can see that the core of it is defensive build which is perhaps your preferred play style, it doesn't lend to a rush build (that doesn't mean you can't win buts its a bad rush army)

so what you have to work with is:

a/. A poor defensive army composition which has plenty of holes in it, wheres the bow samurai and yari/naginata samurai for cavalry denial or counter flanking? These units are very much needed in defensive builds. You need quality and quantity of missile units in an army @ give or take 50:50 ratios to push a missile advantage.

b. Bad rush army army composition you have no support for you ashigaru like katana or no dachi, no flankers like yari samurai, no proper high model cavalry units, your also carrying way to many missile units for this army to be rush, those slots are better given over to melee.

Another thing aswell is +2 armor is a really good thing to get on typically ashigaru, that can be got through a blacksmith or encampment upgrade well worth it when training ashigaru.

[Eddie G]

This game and all total war games for that matter, are designed to play on hard for the optimal experience. Only people who never played total war at all are recommended to play on normal. If you've never played any type of strategy game, then easy is the recommended difficulty. I have noticed in the base game that if you play on very hard, you end up at war with and taking territory similar to real life. Once you master fighting battles, then you will have to learn the strategy for each faction/clan. The best way to do that is on hard. You don't really get the true flavor of the game until you play on hard too. I think most games are designed that way, no matter the genre.

[routley1985]

download super easy campaign that should help you to win any battle :)

[Amplify]

Originally posted by routley1985:

download super easy campaign that should help you to win any battle :)

Why are you spamming old threads?

[BastardSword]

I assume gray means ashigaru and red means samurai.

Even on normal, the only reliable way that yari ashigaru can beat massed samurai units is to use spear wall. And it takes a while to learn how to use it properly. Samurai have better melee stats and MUCH better morale, so they will last longer in a battle while ashigaru will rout much more easily.

If the enemy is coming at you, put your yari ashigaru in spear wall and just let them run into your units.

If the enemy is waiting for you to attack them, put your yari ashigaru into spear wall then order them to move over the enemy. Might take some practice to see what I mean. You can have your yari ashigaru run in spear wall formation if you hit R, they will run forward then go into spear wall when they hit the enemy.

If this is proving too tricky for you, then just replace all or most of your yari ashigaru with samurai. I recommend katana samurai, they are the best all-around samurai unit. The AI almost only uses yari samurai which have very poor stats compared to katana samurai. Samurai are expensive but you are playing on normal so you'll have more money to spend on them compared to higher difficulties.

Get rid of the fire bomb throwers, they are horrible. I think using 1 matchlock unit is a bit tricky but you can have it go to the side and fire into the flanks of the enemy. Protect it from enemy cavalry rushes with your light cavalry, or keep your light cav out of battle until everyone is in a big melee mosh pit, then have the light cav go around the back to kill off the enemy general.